Bio:

Königsberg: Family name derived from the Königsberg. A mountain just to the south of Mordentshire. Famous last stand of an unknown dwarf king who died some 650 yrs ago in a great stone troll incursion. located near the river next to the mountain betwixt Dunkelberg and Rohrhausen near Nuln. http://www.gitzmansgallery.com/Warhamme … index.html

The Königsberg tragedy: begins 4 generations ago. The königsberg family was doing well and the small village of Mordentshire blossomed under the guidance of its benign lordship. Mordentshire and the königsberg estate were constructed 4 generations earlier, after Manfried Von Königsberg had been knighted for his glorious achievements in several military campaigns. Besides his martial prowess Manfred was a skilled merchant. The family fortune grew, which allowed him to build the sizeable estate and lay the foundation for the village of Mordentshire. Everything looked promising for the new noble family, and its influence grew.

Ziegfrieds great grandmother was a beauty amongst beauties. She had two younger sisters of almost equal merits but alas no brothers. This had caused some worries for her aging father, but everything seemed to go in the best of directions when a young gentleman and eminent scientist, Strahd von Carstein, set up home just outside the village of Mordentshire on Gryphon Hill.

Young Strahd was soon invited to visit the Königsberg estate and many visits followed. Ziegfrieds great grandmother(Gretchen) and Strahd became romantically entangled. A wedding date was set, and the family bloodline seemed secure.

But Strahd had just one more experiment to fulfill before the wedding. It was an experiment of unsurpassed genius, but alas it went horribly wrong. In an attempt to separate the dark side of his character from his good, Strahd had created a gigantic apparatus that could split his soul in half. Foolishly thinking, that he could control and destroy his bad side Strahd unleashed a dark horror upon the lands. A battle ensued between the two Strahds. Proving powerful beyond belief, evil Strahd slew his good twin and married Gretchen, the following day.

Soon after Gretchen’s father died when his beloved hunting dogs ripped the old man to shreds. Gretchen caught a strange fever and was kept secluded in her quarters. A strange fever leaving the sick fatigued and pale also swept through Mordentshire. People started to disappear and the situation in the estate got worse by the day. One of Gretchen‘s sisters went insane and had to be placed in a Shallyan sanatorium. The other sister, Karletta, was soon after banished from the estate and left taking along her husband and her remaining two children. With a firm belief, that Strahd had a deep involvement in the tragedy that had hit the königsberg family, Karletta hired some mercenaries and organized a town mob. No records exist of the engagement that followed, but according to family history Karletta, her husband and her eldest child was found impaled on the village square the next morning. The mercenaries were gone and a strange forlorn aura of doom had descended upon the village of Mordentshire. The young and strong left, but most of the villagers were too fatigued in body and mind to leave.

Yrs passed and the last child of the dynasty crew to manhood. Aged only 4 at the time of his family’s impalement Konrad had been saved from death by the aid of a some of the villagers. Konrad grew up in Nuln. His wits soon brought him to the attention of important families, and he succeeded in his career as a business man. Konrad sired 3 children before he had the means to organize an expedition back to the Königsberg estate. Konrad died on the road to Mordentshire, when he was blown of his horse and into a deep ravine by the sudden appearance of a swarm of bats. The expedition was cancelled.

Konrad had three children, a son and two daughters. At the age of 14, one of his daughters mysteriously disappeared at night through a third floor window, never to be heard of again. Fearing the loss of anymore of her children, and having a mad dream of reclaiming her lost daughter at the königsberg estate, Konrad’s wife set a hopeless plan in motion. Her last daughter was given to the care of the local Morr brotherhood, and her son was sent to the military academy in Altdorf. She then set off for Mordentshire, never to be heard off again.

At the age of 7 Ziegfried lost his father. His father, Ruprecht, had joined an adventuring party and they all went missing on an ill fated expedition to Mordentshire.

Ziegfrieds mother killed herself following the demise of her husband, and Ziegfried was then given to the care of the military academy in Altdorf where he grew up.

Some notes on Ziegfried becoming a Knight of Woe:

Following the S’iba’aht incident Ziegfried had a nervous breakdown of titanic proportions. Suicidal and soul maimed Ziegfried gave up his hold on life as he knew it. To hell with the empire! To hell with law and order chaos and anarchy! To hell with the armies of Karl Franz and the legions of the damned! Ziegfried wandered the streets of Marienburgh aimlessly and finally ended up in the gardens of Morr. He had decided upon a new start, a new beginning free from the fetters of the powers that be. Ziegfried would form his own destiny, master his own fate. Upon an unmarked grave he began a series of meditations and ceremonies that would strip him of his old straps n’ reigns and create an impetus for his new life. Ziegfried made a small fire by the grave and resolutely burned the effigies of his past. All his medals, papers and uniform where thrown on the fire. He heated his dagger ‘till it became red hot, and solemnly began to burn away all his old military tattoos.

At that point an old priest of Morr approached Ziegfried. Not being accustomed to people having quasi-religious and otherwise emotional experiences at gravesites the priest tried to have Ziegfried stop his endeavours. With the greatest effort at politeness, Ziegfried tried to persuade the priest to leave him to his business, but alas the senile old Morrian would have none of it. More Morrians was summoned and eventually they gave up on convincing Ziegfried that what he was doing was wrong, disrespectable in a garden of Morr and against common decency in general. As usual when confronted with the unnatural and strange, the priest decided to call the guards. Not having completed his initiations Ziegfried was forcefully arrested and thrown in a jail cell with an old street drunk.

What ignorant malicious fools thought Ziegfried! Any respect for the old imbecile society and especially the Morrian thralls and the lackeys of the rich and powerful was completely removed.
Right there in the jail cell Ziegfried continued his initiations and took his solemn oaths with only the old drunkard as perplexed witness.

The Oath:
I, Ziegfried do most solemnly swear, by the great void and his unspeakable name, and in free and voluntary desire, to serve as a Knight of Königsberg of the most holy Order of Woe. I also swear by all that is holy and dear unto me (wife, family and estate), to aid those less fortunate than I, to relieve the distress of the world and to fulfil my knightly obligations. This oath do I give of my own free and independent will, so help me Gods!

Hriliu!

To respect all weaknesses, and constitute myself the defender of them; Women, children and the elderly are weaker and more innocent than men. I shall defend this innocence!
To not recoil before his enemy; and not be scared!
To make war against the Infidel (those who attack the weak and the poor) without cessation, and without mercy!
To perform scrupulously my feudal duties, if they be not contrary to my other oaths!
To remain faithful to my pledged word!
To be everywhere and always the champion of the Right and the Good against Injustice and Evil!
To serve the Königsberg linage in valour and faith!
To refrain from the wanton giving of offence!
To live by honour and for glory!
To despise pecuniary reward!
To fight for the welfare of all!
To guard the honour of fellow Knights of Woe!
To eschew unfairness, meanness and deceit!
To keep faith!
To persevere to the end in any enterprise begun!
To respect the honour of women!
Never to refuse a challenge from an equal!
To honour my wife above all and bear an heir to the Königsberg estate!
To vanquish the evil that has infested the Königsberg lands!
To reinstate the Königsberg family in its rightful place as lords of its land!

Hriliu F’tagn!

In the morning Ziegfried was released from his dark cell to venture forth and do his bidding amongst the light and the living…